The G-word

Turkey has recalled its ambassador to the U.S. "for consultations." Whatever. Hey, Nabi Sensoy, if you move fast enough, the door won’t hit your ass on the way out. I am not sorry that the truth could prove to be "very injurious . . . to the psyche of the Turkish people."

You can tell I will never be a diplomat.

And nor will Egemen Bagis, a foreign policy adviser to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who said in Washington, "Yesterday some in Congress wanted to play hardball. . . . I can assure you Turkey knows how to play hardball." Bagis went on to warn that if the full House passes its nonbinding resolution (declaring the Armenian genocide genocide), "We will do something and I can promise you it won't be pleasant." Oh, come on, Egemen, holocaust denial is soooo 20th century. And you really are protesting too much.

A man on the street, apparently of Turkish origin, told a radio reporter that politicians should stay out of the genocide question and leave it up to historians. Oh, really? Thank you for that insight, Man On The Street. You mean historians in Turkey? A country that convicts citizens of Turkey who write about the topic in a way their government does not agree with?

Our president isn’t much better than that Man On The Street. In his comments yesterday, President Bush was able to describe "the tragic suffering of the Armenian people that began in 1915" as "historic mass killings." Hmmm, if only there was a convenient one-word term for historic mass killings of members of a specific population. Oh, well. If politicians can't come up with a word, I'm sure some writer or historian will.